To be honest, after a weekend in Scarborough, Pete and I were a wee bit jaded on Monday night and a drive through to Glasgow on a cold, wet evening was not the first thing on the agenda. However, the tickets had been bought and paid for sometime ago and, well, it was The Hives.
Once we got parked up and headed into The Barrowlands, that jaded feeling started to lift. The place was already busy when we arrived around 7:45 with a real mix of older rockers and much younger fans.
The lights dipped at 8 sharp and the first band of the evening appeared. I didn’t know who they were or, at that point, even their name but I was convinced they were my kinda thing when I saw them in cut off Ramones and Misfits t-shirts and sporting low slung guitars.
Bad Nerves, by now had learned their name, cracked straight into the first of their ten songs. I didn’t catch the name of any of them, but I loved them all. This was old school Ramones style punk rock performed by the young team. The music was tight, there were split kicks by the bucketful and the odd 1-2-3-4 yelled out to start the next song. There were no silences between numbers and they just powered through unabashed. The singer was off the stage mixing it with the front of the crowd who had formed a pretty active mosh pit and taking up a bit of crowd surfing.
After 30 minutes, it was all over. I thought Bad Nerves were absolutely stonking. Punk rock needs an injection of young band energy it to truly keep going. This was the sort of band who could do that. I will be looking out them again and would encourage any fan of the Ramones and fast music to look them up too. A top start to the night.
This was a Hives gig, so it was always going to have a little bit of a different feel. Instead of the usual roadies in cargo shorts calling 2,2,2 into a mike, this concert was set up by a couple of ninja warriors. Clad in black ninja kit complete with facemasks, black webbed belts and fighting shoes, these two guys set up the band before standing at the side of the stage waiting to hand over guitars to the evening’s protagonists.
These protagonists have been doing this for years. Coming from Sweden, they have pretty much been a constant unit since they kicked off in 1993 with only one change of personnel. The only time I’ve seen them before was at Download. I’m not an Iron Maiden fan – yeah, judge all you like, they’ve simply got too much going on – so rather than watching Maiden I went to watch this Scandic combo in a packed tent. They blew me away and I’ve been keen to see them since. That’s been a bit challenging as they tend to only play festivals over here or as special guests to others, I am less keen on – their spot with the Artic Monkeys last year being case in point. The absolute energy they baked into that show then blew me away, I was looking forward to seeing a full set.
The lights went down and Chopin’s Funeral March came through the PA at volume. Both guitars and bass arrived on stage with drummer, Chris Dangerous, directing proceedings. There was no messing about, Danger got the crowd clapping away as the first riffs began to be pounded away.
Then the singer appeared; the Duracell battery of a front man that is Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist. Like the rest of the band, he was resplendent in a black suit with white musical motifs all over the front and back set off with white shirt and matador tie. It's a Hives thing, looking quirky and great at the same time.
Then we were off, Bogus Operandi kicked on, the first of seven songs from their new album The Death of Randy Fitzsimmons. Main Offender was next before the Take Back the Toys, which took things up another notch. I have rarely seen energy like it at a gig. Pelle much have covered every inch of the Barrowland stage several times over. He spent a good bit of time on the barrier with the crowd and a wee bit of time on the crowd side of that divide. If there was a course in being a front man, Pelle would be the professor. He engaged the throng fantastically, shooting his mike over the heads of the fans, getting a good bit of banter going and doing call and reply with a skill perfected over many years.
The ninjas made a few appearances too. Tuning guitars, playing tambourine and sorting out all manner of stage issues along the way, they really added to the night.
More music, Walk Idiot Walk got an outing along the way to 2011’s Go Right Ahead. There was just not relenting. Guitarist, Nicholaus Arson took off his jacket, his white shirt completely opaque with sweat. This was a high energy show all round.
The appropriately named, Countdown to Shutdown, took us to the end of the set; another new song that the fans all loved. By now the floor in the Barrowlands was shaking, as pretty much, everyone in the place was jumping for all they were worth.
During the bands short absence, the call for more never stopped. It was great to be part of it. For a mega deserved encore, another new song, Smoke and Mirrors, was sandwiched between Come On and show ender Tick Tick Boom.
As the lights came up Carly Simon’s Nobody Does it Better was blasted out. It's fair to say this is a band who don’t suffer from self-doubt, and on the evidence of tonight that confidence is well founded.
Sometimes performers forget who they are doing it for, or why they are on stage. Sometimes they can be a bit of introspection and self indulgence. Tonight we watched two bands who clearly understood their job – entertain the crowd. They achieved that in spades. As we headed back into the night, we were smiling, as was pretty much everyone I saw. The backstairs out of the venue resounded to a chorus of Come On sung by happy fans heading out into the night.
We might have been a little jaded on arrival, but as we drove east that had worn off as we chatted about the night and how much music would benefit from a bit more of a Hives outlook on life.